Just Because
by Libazeth
Summary: A couple short stories I wrote many pairings, many stories.
1. Carry This Picture

DISCLAIMER: I don't own the OC or the song.  
  
Ryan/Teresa  
  
Teresa looked across the table at the prim, plucked girl across from her. She reached up to brush back a lock of her hair, running it down to touch the chain around her neck. She'd been wearing it since he left, wondering if he was okay, trying to keep some part or him close. A locket, her in one half with pigtails and a grin, him with a smile about to crack his face in two. She wondered if Marissa had seen it. She found herself hoping that she hadn't. The new girl reminded her of hospitals, clean and perfect on the outside but bloody and tense and broken inside, running on everyone else's belief that everything was all right.  
  
She smiled to herself. Ryan would have liked that one- she stopped. She could tell him, now. She'd been thinking in the past tense for months now, habit as she tried to wean herself off him. Ryan was an ocean to her, calm on the outside, mellow, stubborn, but inside it was powerful and strong and once you were in it was hard to get out.  
  
When they were little, young, they'd promised to stay together forever together no matter what. She'd imagined them married, in a perfect marriage where they'd escape everything they grew up with. In middle school, when they lost the ability to ignore everything wrong in their worlds, when Ryan had lost his virginity to another girl while Teresa did her first pot at a party, they promised that they'd depend on each other for everything, wouldn't lie or keep things, and stick together. She'd imagined him for her first time, and they'd leave and get jobs in a new city. In high school, when they started having sex and Tray went to jail for the first time and they tried crack Ryan got from his mom's boyfriend and they ended up on the beach watching the sunrise through lidded eyes, they promised that they wouldn't leave.  
  
Teresa still wanted to leave, but she'd had stopped dreaming. Ryan had, too. They no longer made plans to do things together, hung out at school and did their best to avoid sobriety around each other. Neither wanted to see what had happened, knew that if they looked into each other's eyes they'd see everything they'd hated in their parents. Dependency and addiction and bad choices littering their past, their future.  
  
He'd gotten out. He'd found a way to sneak away, to escape. It wasn't that he hadn't taken her, that she'd kept hoping after he gave up, that he had dragged her into helplessness with him. It was that he'd found out that not everything was doomed, and he hadn't told her.  
  
Carry This Picture, Dashboard Confessionals  
  
(Carry this picture for luck, kept in a locket  
  
Tucked in your collar, close to your chest  
  
Make it a secret, shown to the closest friends  
  
And meet me at quarter to seven  
  
The sun will still shine then at this time of year  
  
We'll head to the inlet, and we'll share a bottle there  
  
And color the coast with your smile  
  
It's the most genuine thing I've ever seen  
  
I was so lost, but now, I believe  
  
And follow me south of the big docks  
  
Where they tether the boats  
  
The rich men revere as so important  
  
The hire our fathers to steer  
  
And down to the edge of the water  
  
Where we'll spill our guts  
  
And we'll name our fears, I'll give you this picture  
  
Keep it and don't be scared  
  
And color the coast with your smile  
  
It's the most genuine thing I've ever seen  
  
I was lost, but now, I believe in the coast  
  
Your smile is the most genuine thing I've ever seen  
  
I was lost, but now, I believe) 


	2. Bend and Not Break

Bend and Not Break  
  
Seth/Summer  
  
Summer hated popularity. She hated being kept in line with everyone else, hated smiling with everyone else. But hate was an attracting force, and when she'd met Marissa in first grade she'd liked the girl, known that behind her sheep exterior there was a mind and an imagination. She'd become popular by default as Marissa smiled her way through school, keeping in step and in line. She pushed when she could, knowing that no one dared to fight back. She learned to act dumb and blond while behind her dark hair thoughts flew through her mind, jokes that no one else would get that made her smile. From her popularity, this made her mysterious, while another little boy was ridiculed for it. She was malicious and honest, told people to their face what everyone else kept behind their backs. She was, however, dedicated to the people she liked, and helped clean up Marissa's messed. In return, Marissa tagged along for the ride and knowingly tidied up the trail of destruction left her wake as she ruthlessly went for what she wanted. Now she was risking that. She's quickly learned where the lines where, where they were flexible in the social hierarchy, where she could get away with doing what she wanted, where she needed to go to stay in her place. One very, very inflexible line was Don't Get Involved With Anyone Dorky. The king of those deemed dorky was Seth Cohen. The kid with all the money, only grandchild to Caleb Cohen, whose name Summer had known since age eight when she realized that money was all that mattered in this world. A kid who laughed at jokes no one got and told people what he thought and shyly admired her. She'd known this forever, held it over him. She was ashamed of that now, felt a little bad, but not enough to risk her popularity over him when she realized he was an okay guy. Then, to the internal scream that ripped through her head, she'd found herself kissing him. And all the kisses from the jocks and the rich brokers paled in comparison, because the kid could kiss. He was nervous, and his hands were sweating, but that was okay with Summer. He made her see fireworks behind her eyes and made her feel like she could do whatever she wanted as she walked away from that first kiss, she knew that he would get her jokes. But it wasn't worth it. Unpopularity was death in her mind, and she was dependant on everything it brought. The protection and the connections and everything she though was unfair and mocked were suddenly being threatened and she realized how important they were. Then Ryan happened. Cohen found more and more confidence, and Marissa fell away from the popularity. Summer was left trailing after Marissa, pointing back at the world where they'd been adored and asking, 'Don't you want that instead?' Marissa gave it all up for Ryan. Anna appeared, and Seth liked her, and Summer was out in the cold. She'd gone after Seth, hoping that, in some way, she wouldn't be completely lost, but he was already laughing at Anna's jokes and sharing his with her and when Summer came after him, almost caught him, he didn't want her anymore. She pretended that she didn't care that no one wanted her anymore. But that was okay, because she didn't want her anymore either.  
  
Bend and not Break, Dashboard Confessionals (I catalog these steps now, decisive and intentioned  
  
Precise and patterned specifically to yours  
  
I'm talented at breathing, especially exhaling  
  
So that my chest will rise and fall with yours  
  
I'm careful not to wake you, fearing conversation  
  
It's better just to hold you and keep pacified  
  
I'm talented with reason, I cover all the angles  
  
I can't fail before I ever try  
  
Try to understand, there is an old mistake that fools will make  
  
And I'm the king of them, pushing everything that's good away  
  
So won't you hold me ? I will not bend, I will not break  
  
Won't you hold me now? For you I rise, for you I fall  
  
I am fairly agile, I can bend and not break  
  
Or I can break and take it with a smile  
  
And I am so resilient, I recover quickly  
  
I'll convince you soon that I am fine) 


	3. Ghost of a Good Thing

Ghost of a Good Thing  
  
Ryan/Summer  
  
Ryan watched her when she wasn't looking. She watched him back whenever he was busy. He and Marissa were in the pool house, kissing, talking, obviously in love. She and Seth hung out in his room, watched movies, joking and teasing and kissing to shut the other up. They argued about everything and then they went back to perfect teenage love. Over Seth's shoulder, over Marissa's head, they danced at the party and pretended that it was okay. They pretended that they were in love, and they were happy, and nothing could change that. Drinks later, Marissa's dad picked her up and Ryan stayed behind, worried, and Seth had gone home and Summer was bored, and there was nothing stopping them as Ryan offered to drive her home. They didn't love each other. They weren't in love, they tried not to care, not to see that they were cut the same. They were both wise, didn't say what they meant, knew more than they let on. The drive home was silent. In her driveway, they kissed. It was too hard, and their noses bumped, and he didn't know where to put his hands and her ring got caught in his hair. Her head tilted up so that it hurt her neck, and their chests heaved hard as they pulled apart. It felt perfect. It wasn't love. The next day, Ryan happily kissed Marissa hello, held her to his chest as they watched a movie in the den. Summer and Seth made out upstairs on top of his comics, pulling apart only to continue arguing. Summer sat in Seth's lap and watched Ryan as he made grilled cheese. Ryan watched her out the window as she walked to her car. Then they went back to being separately in love.  
  
Ghost of a Good Thing, Dashboard Confessionals  
  
(I guess it's luck, but it's the same hard luck  
  
You've been trying to tame  
  
Maybe it's love but it's like you said...  
  
Love is like a role that we play  
  
But I believe in you so much  
  
I could die for the words that you say  
  
But you're chasing the ghost of a good thing  
  
Haunting yourself,  
  
As the real thing is getting away from you again  
  
while you're chasing ghosts  
  
Just bend the pieces 'till they fit  
  
Like they were made for it  
  
But they weren't made for this  
  
No, they weren't made for this) 


	4. Rapid Hope Loss

Rapid Hope Loss  
  
Seth/Ryan  
  
Seth stared out the window to the ocean, sparkling below the red setting sun. It was a sight that had calmed him for most of his life, caring and serene. Tonight, it just seemed sad, maddening. The ocean sparkled as though it had no care about his broken world, the sun was red like the blood he was sure was trailing behind him, heart tattered on the floor. Silence rang, the click of the phone echoing in his ear, drowning out her harsh words. His life would never be the same, crying that his view of the world would be forever jaded by this horror. Her malicious words, picked to hurt him the most, make him hate her and maybe help drown the pain. They didn't. Instead, his dream of her changed, seeing past all the excuses he'd made for her and all the things he'd ignored to make her perfect. He'd lived for her, an ideal, and now she'd fallen of her pedestal and smashed it. As the sun dipped below the sea, the waves still beat themselves against the sand and hazy clouds still rolled languidly across the blackening sky. His eye fell to the light in the pool house, illuminating the boy inside against the night. Seth was reminded of his grandmother's old saying- Red sky at night, sailors delight; Red sky at morning, sailors take warning. He looked out once more to the horizon, now only a faint line in the midst of the darkness. Maybe tomorrow would be better.  
  
Rapid Hope Loss, Dashboard Confessional  
  
(You called to say you wanted out  
  
Well, I can't say I blame you now  
  
Sometimes you've got to fold before you're found out  
  
Well thanks for waiting this long to show yourself  
  
'Cause now that I can see you  
  
I don't think you're worth a second glance  
  
So much for all the promises you made, they served you well  
  
Now you're gone and they're wasted on me  
  
So much for your endearing sense of charm, it served you well  
  
Now it's just worn and wasted on me  
  
I guess that all you've got is all you're gonna get) 


End file.
